Auditor Galloway releases audit of St. Ann municipal court

JEFFERSON CITY, MO (Dec. 22, 2015) Missouri State Auditor Nicole Galloway today released an audit of the municipal court of St. Ann. The audit was conducted as part of the Municipal Courts Initiative, which expands the standard court audit process to examine statistical information, tickets and other penalties, and seeks to identify practices that may affect impartiality or damage the court’s credibility with citizens.

Auditors did not identify any significant weaknesses in the operations of St. Ann’s municipal court, although they did identify some concerns with city practices. For example, in 2014 the city’s police department collected approximately $38,000 in bond processing fees. This included a $25 bond fee to process cash bond payments and a $10 bond fee to process credit card bond payments. State law does not give cities the authority to collect such fees and the department discontinued this practice earlier this year.

The full audit report, which received an overall performance rating of “good,” is available here.